


Diamond

by VioVayo



Category: Deponia (Video Games)
Genre: Angst, Bittersweet, F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Narcissistic Personality Disorder, Personality Split, Rufus lives AU, Rufus with a brain implant, Self-Hatred, self-indulgent as fuuuuck
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-17
Updated: 2020-12-17
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:42:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28121811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VioVayo/pseuds/VioVayo
Summary: This is a story about pain.Or: Rufus is not okay, and this time it shows.
Relationships: Goal & Rufus (Deponia), Goal/Rufus (Deponia)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 15





	Diamond

**Author's Note:**

> Huge thanks to [s.](https://archiveofourown.org/users/apockalypsis) for her absolutely stellar beta work, once again!

Rufus had never been the most put together person, visually. Even life on Elysium hadn’t been able to remove the remnants of Deponia that still stubbornly clung to him (or maybe that he still clung to), and at this point it was apparent that it never would. The point was, it wasn’t unusual to see Rufus with his clothes, hair, everything, in disarray, fretting over whatever project had put him in that state, and it wasn’t unusual for him to whine about the outside influences that caused his plans to fail, either.

“Goooaaal!” 

Yup. There he went again. With a sigh that wasn’t unaffectionate, Goal looked up from the cup of soyoccino she had been planning to enjoy in peace, and at the familiar sight of a very dishevelled Rufus standing in her door. “What did you do?”

“ _I_ didn’t do anything!” Rufus insisted, letting the door slide shut behind him. Again, nothing out of the ordinary. “There’s a, uh… a—” He muttered something that sounded suspiciously like _problem,_ and Goal resigned herself to it being one of those days.

“You’ll have to be more specific,” she said.

“You remember the Floating Black Market?” Rufus looked sheepish. His hand disappeared into his pocket, and he dug around in it for a few seconds before finding what he was looking for among the assortment of random objects he always seemed to carry around. 

The soyoccino was forgotten now. “Rufus.” Goal’s voice took on a warning edge as her eyes fell onto the datasette cartridges in the man’s hands. She asked again, “What did you do?”

“I don’t know!” Rufus whined. “It must have been one of the other two. And now I—”

“—Need my help?”

“Need is a strong word…”

Goal raised an eyebrow.

“I could fix this on my own! But it would be easier if you could…” He trailed off, gesturing with the cartridges. “You know?”

She knew. Of course she knew. Her memories of that time were fragmented, like pieces from different puzzles that fit into each other perfectly to form a chimeric mess of a picture, but there was no way she could forget. They’d been here before, just with their roles reversed.

“You want me to talk to your other selves.” It was an observation, not a question. “Have you spoken with Doc already?”

The answer, judging by the appalled face Rufus made, was no. Then it was in words too. “We don’t need to involve him. Fixing this will be easy to a _genius_ such as myself.” Well, at least it was apparent where Rufus’ overconfidence had ended up. “I just need to find out what those weird wires were.”

“Riiight,” Goal said slowly, doubtful and more than a bit concerned by what she was hearing. She made a mental note to pay Doc a visit on Rufus’ behalf later. “Wires… Do you remember what you were doing at all?”

Rufus shrugged, in a manner that made it very clear that no, he did not. 

Goal sighed. Again. “And you think those memories could have ended up with a different part?” 

He nodded.

“Alright. Alright, I’ll talk to them, and I’ll let you know what I find out.”

She stood up and reached for the cartridges. Rufus pulled his hand away before she could grab them. “Actually,” he started, and Goal already regretted her decision to help. “I was hoping you could lend me your body so I could talk to them myself.”

“Rufus—”

“That’s a no, then?”

“That’s an absolutely not.”

Rufus frowned, but did not otherwise move.

Just as Goal’s patience was about to run out, as she withdrew her hand again—If he wanted to be stubborn, so be it, that was on him—he spoke up. “Okay, fine. You talk to them. Just… get it over with quickly.” He grabbed her hand and pushed the datasettes into it.

Only then did it really click what it was she was holding.

With her free hand, Goal reached for Rufus’ face. She brushed aside a few strands of his hair, always just a bit too long no matter how often he had it cut, and rested her fingers on top of the implant, too light to trigger the cartridge release mechanism just yet. It was the same as hers, at least externally. For the first time since he’d suffered the injury that had forced him to get it installed, Rufus didn’t flinch or shy away.

“Do you trust me?” she asked.

Rufus blinked at her in confusion. “Of course. That’s why I came to you.”

Goal took a deep breath. “Okay,” she said. This was happening. There was no turning back now. “Are you ready?”

Rufus’ nod was all the permission she needed. With a gentle press in just the right place, and a quiet, almost inaudible click, the datasette cartridge was ejected from Rufus’ head and he collapsed into Goal’s arms.

\---------

Goal had thought she could handle Rufus just fine. She had quite a bit of experience dealing with him by now, and while his unpredictability was impossible to get completely used to, she still thought she would have everything under control.

She did not, as it turned out, have everything under control.

“—so if there’s anything you can tell me, anything at all, that would be helpful,” Goal concluded her summary of events to the best of her understanding. She was pretty sure Rufus, a part of him, the second one, _had_ heard her. Pretty sure. But was he _listening_ to a word she said?

“Uh huh,” Rufus said, audibly disinterested. He sat across from her and fiddled with an empty paper towel roll that he had produced from his coat a few seconds prior.

If he was, he was damn good at hiding it.

“Rufus, I’m serious. Will you put that thing away? I—Why do you even have that?”

He looked at her, finally. The bored expression gave way to an excited one, and his eyes lit up as he answered, “I haven't decided yet. A pipe bomb, maybe?”

“A pi—” Goal wished she hadn’t asked. “Rufus! No!”

“Calm down…” Rufus rolled his eyes. _Bonk._ The cardboard tube made a hollow noise as he knocked it against the table edge in front of him. “I said _maybe._ I _was_ going to fill this up with black powder, or nitroglycerine, and prank Cletus with it, but then I thought that’s kind of boring.” _Bonk._ “So I’m considering other uses.”

 _Like what,_ the question burned on Goal’s mind, but she thought better than to voice it. As long as Rufus wasn’t actively setting things on fire, or making them explode, there were more pressing matters to discuss.

 _Bonk._ Rufus giggled.

The temptation to rip that thing from his hands and set it on fire was growing stronger with each passing second. She wouldn’t, of course. She was, largely, above such things, but had it been her in fragments instead of him… Goal rubbed at her temple, avoiding the implant. “Stop that,” she warned.

With a pout, Rufus lowered the offending piece of cardboard onto the polished table surface, and said, “You’re no fun.”

Then he began drumming his fingers against the damn thing instead. Loudly.

Looking back, Goal should have seen it coming. Rufus’ unruliness had to have gone _somewhere,_ and the first fragment she’d talked to had been too cooperative. Maybe she should’ve just taken that Rufus’ offer, let him borrow her body and handle this himself. Maybe she shouldn’t have let herself get involved at all. He _had_ insisted he didn’t _need_ her help.

But he had asked for it, and while a part of Goal wanted to strangle the man in front of her right now, another part was just…

Soft.

“Just tell me what I need to know so we can get this over with,” she said, almost pleaded. “Please?”

The drumming continued, and Rufus had the gall to grin. “I thought pipe bomb was a pretty clear answer.”

“No, not that. About your consciousness being in pieces… You weren’t listening to a word I said, were you.”

“Nope. You weren’t saying anything interesting, so…”

Her limit reached, Goal’s hand darted across the table. She snatched that blasted cardboard tube from right under Rufus’ fingers, ignoring his protests, and stuck it under her arm, out of his reach. The glare she directed at him—a thing she’d picked up from her father—would’ve struck terror into the hearts of Elysium’s bravest. She’d inherited the authoritative tone from Ulysses too. “This is serious!”

“But I feel fine,” Rufus whined. He didn’t even look her in the eyes, instead staring longingly at the confiscated object with the expression of a grieving widow overlooking her late husband’s grave. A closer look, and his bottom lip quivered. Oh dear.

That did give Goal an idea though. “I promise you can have it back after you tell me what happened,” she offered, trying to sound more patient than she really felt. That approach seemed to be the correct one. Her words hit their mark, and Rufus sat up straighter, suddenly very interested. “When your consciousness split, what were you doing?”

He thought it over for a moment, then unhelpfully answered, “Stuff.”

A beat of silence passed.

“Stuff,” repeated Goal, exasperated.

“Stuff,” affirmed Rufus. Suddenly, and without warning, he rose to his feet and slammed both palms onto the table, causing the cup of by now cold soyoccino to clatter uncomfortably. “I know!” he declared, bouncing on the balls of his feet. “Bees!”

“Bees?”

Goal was completely, utterly, lost.

“Ronny can print a bunch of live bees, right?”

“What do bees have to do with your consciousness?”

Rufus shook his head at a speed that looked downright painful, which would’ve been concerning had he been anyone else. “No, for the pipe bomb! I’m going to fill it with bees!”

“The—”

In all her time spent around Rufus, which just by eventfulness alone had to be equivalent to several average lifetimes, Goal had never felt this specific blend of anger, frustration, and pure amazement before.

She was going to kill him.

If this kept up for long enough, by junk, she was going to murder him.

This time Rufus didn’t miss the glare. He, miraculously, did stop beaming like an idiot and slowly, slowly, let himself sink back down into the chair.

Deep breaths.

When Goal spoke, it was again with the authoritative tone of the Prime Controller’s daughter. “We are not talking about that right now. _Stuff_ is not an answer, and you’re not getting this _—”_ She grabbed the cardboard tube from under her arm and waved it at Rufus threateningly. “—back until you give me a proper one.”

“You know those aren’t rare, right?”

“Rufus!”

“Okay, okay!” Rufus defensively put his hands up. “I don’t know what you want to hear though. I was just testing this thing I made.”

“Go on,” Goal prompted. Finally it felt like they were getting somewhere. “What thing?”

“I built this thing out of copper wire and hot glue, and some other things I found,” Rufus explained through a pout. “And a bunch of empty cartridges. To let me access and edit what’s on mine while it’s still in my head. So I was testing that, and then I wanted to see what would happen if I moved some things around and—”

“Wait, wait, wait—” Goal interrupted, wide eyed and absolutely horrified. Discomfort prickled at the back of her neck as the pieces finally started falling into place. “You built _what?!”_

“A thing.” Rufus stroked his chin thoughtfully. “I guess it does still need a cool name.” It didn’t appear as though he cared about the implications of what he was saying at all.

“Rufus, you’re—” Deep. Breaths. “You’re not supposed to manually change what’s on your datasette. Especially not while you’re using it!”

Just imagining it made Goal feel a little sick. She remembered Cletus messing around in her head—Cletus, who, unlike Rufus, knew his way around code. She remembered the anxiety that came with putting her mind into the hands of people who knew what they were doing. And here Rufus was, messing with his for… fun?

No, there was no way. There had to be a better reason. Maybe it was foolish, wishful thinking, but Goal had to believe that not even Rufus could be that reckless.

“Do you have any idea how much could go wrong? That’s dangerous!”

Rufus simply shrugged, and laughed. “Haha, yeah… but it’s neat!” He reached across the table to pluck the empty paper towel roll from her hand, and she let him.

Goal was at a loss for words. It took her a few seconds to formulate anything at all, and even then it barely passed as a sentence. “Okay, but—why?”

“I don’t know.” Rufus resumed fiddling with the cardboard tube. “We were trying to do… something, but I don’t know what.”

“And that doesn’t bother you?” Goal asked.

“Nah,” came the simple but infuriating answer.

With a deep sigh, Goal let her head fall against the backrest. She stared up at the ceiling, running through everything she’d learnt in her head. Cybernetics was far from her field of expertise, but with it being such an integral part of her life, she understood at least the fundamentals. If it _was_ just a case of some misplaced chunks of data, the problem would be easily fixed the same way it had occurred. Going just off what Rufus had said, that was most likely it.

A look down at him revealed him staring back at her through the cardboard tube, grinning.

On the other hand, if the… whatever he did damaged the hardware, a trip to Doc’s would be unavoidable. Either way, it would be best to have the old tinkerer look Rufus over, just to make sure—but the first fragment had already made his stance on involving Doc clear, and Goal doubted she could get this one to agree to a medical check-up either.

“Hey, Rufus.” She’d keep that in mind as Plan B then. “Do you still have the thing?”

The man’s grin twisted into a grimace. “I totally need a better name for that, that’s just _lame.”_

“But you do have it, right?” Rufus reached into his coat, felt around in it for a moment, then made a noise in the affirmative. “Could you put yourself back together with that?”

“Probably,” he said.

“And will you?” Goal pushed further.

At this point she wasn’t even surprised when Rufus just gave her a dismissive shrug. “If I feel like it.” He knocked the empty paper towel roll lightly against his forehead, making her wish she’d never let him take it back. “I have better things to do. Like filling this thing with bees. So if that’s all—”

It was pointless.

There was no way this fragment would ever share her priorities.

He got up, and as he turned away so did Goal. Just as he was about to run off, presumably to go bully Ronny into enabling his terrible idea, she said, “I have an idea you’ll like.”

He halted mid-step.

“You want to prank Cletus with that thing, right?”

The paper towel roll had made for an excellent bargaining chip earlier. At least for a while. It had worked better than anything else she’d tried in any case, and it was getting clearer and clearer that the best strategy to deal with this particular Rufus was to adapt his way of thinking. Goal had to speak his language. No pleading, no threatening.

She had his attention.

“What if I told you I have something you could put in there that’s even _cooler_ than bees?”

 _“Cooler_ than bees?”

 _“So much cooler_ than bees. And if you fix your consciousness, I’ll tell you what it is.”

Maybe that was an underhanded tactic. Those words sounded manipulative even to her own ears, and she wasn’t even _lying._

But it was for Rufus’ own sake. And she was doing Cletus a favour in the process too.

Rufus didn’t immediately start heading for the door again, and Goal took him staying where he was as a sign to be hesitantly hopeful. He looked conflicted, biting at his lip as he considered it. “I don’t know…” he said, but his eyes were shining with barely concealed excitement. “Bees would be really funny.”

“They would be, but consider this… You _could_ go ahead and pull a—well, an _okay_ prank on him that will annoy him for a while. Or you could take my offer and prank him with something amazing that will stick with him forever.”

Rufus nodded, slowly, understanding, and Goal knew she had him.

“I promise it’ll be the first thing we’ll do once you’re back together. You’ll remember us having this conversation, so you can hold me to it.”

By the time she finished speaking, Rufus’ hand had already vanished deep within that impossible coat of his, taking that accursed cardboard tube with it. “I’ll get right on it then,” he declared with a widening grin. That kind of enthusiasm was definitely preferable to his complete indifference earlier, and it was nice to see her new approach was working, but—

“Wait.” Goal took a step towards him and he froze. The grin faltered. He let out an annoyed whine.

“There’s _more?”_

“I haven’t spoken with your third fragment yet. It wouldn’t be fair to go behind his back on this.”

“Ugh, but that will take _forever!”_

Rufus rolled his eyes and Goal wanted to do the same. She owed all of Rufus the same respect he’d shown her back when it was her in pieces, but she knew better than to expect this particular part of him to understand.

It really was like talking to a child.

“I already promised the first Rufus I’ll make it quick, so don’t worry,” she said. Like talking to a child. “If you can wait just that little bit longer, I’ll treat you to some ice cream. How does that sound?”

That seemed to do the trick. “You’ll really do that?” Rufus asked.

“What better way to discuss an amazing plan for a prank than over some ice cream.” Goal offered him a smile that was only somewhat forced, and he gleefully returned one of his own. “Just sit down again, and leave the rest to me. You won’t even notice time passed at all.”

Maybe not all that surprisingly, Rufus actually did as he was told.

Goal was at his side, and he tilted his head to allow her better access. Again, it was weird to see him so… calm wasn’t the right word with this one, but he expressed no discomfort when she reached for his implant, not verbally or otherwise. “You’ll be okay,” she assured anyway. “We’ll see each other again in a bit.”

“Yeah yeah… Get on with it already.” He bounced impatiently in his seat.

Then he was out cold.

Goal took a moment to steady him, making sure Rufus wouldn’t fall out of the chair the second she let go of him.

She breathed a sigh of relief. Unconscious like this, Rufus looked so uncharacteristically peaceful that it was almost eerie, but the temporary quiet wasn’t unwelcome.

The cartridge found its place between the other two, neatly laid out next to each other so she wouldn’t forget which one belonged to which fragment. She had briefly considered labelling them, but had decided against it. There wasn’t much of a point to it, since Rufus was going to be a whole person again in a few hours anyway.

She picked up the third cartridge.

Whatever traits ended up on this one, they couldn’t be more frustrating to handle than what Goal had just dealt with. Though she loved him a lot, Rufus’ childish side was easily the most infuriating one even when it made up only a third of his personality.

She couldn’t help but wonder what the first fragment—the one who was at least sensible enough to have come to her for help—would have thought of his counterpart’s behaviour. She wondered if Rufus would later look back on their conversation like Goal did on the crude actions of her spunky self. Or the things she’d done as—

They really were more than the sum of their parts, weren’t they.

Goal shooed those thoughts from her mind and returned to Rufus’ side, cartridge in hand. It would be smooth sailing from here, she thought, as she aligned the datasette with the slot in his head and carefully pushed it in until it clicked into place, triggering the soft hum of circuitry that signalled the cartridge’s data being read. She would simply inform the last fragment of what the situation was, because it was only fair, it was the right thing to do, and that would be that.

Well, mostly.

There was also a question she still wanted answered.

Rufus’ expression contorted. His brows drew together and his mouth twisted into a scowl, a clear sign that he was awake. A second later, his eyes fluttered open.

One more time then, from the top. “Hello, Rufus,” Goal started, offering him a soft smile. “There’s been an—”

“Don’t touch me.”

She blinked, taken aback. Once. Twice. “I’m sorry what—”

“I said don’t touch me,” Rufus spat. His hand was on hers suddenly, and he shoved it away from his face, making Goal take a surprised step backwards that put more distance between them. The glare he directed at her rendered her momentarily speechless.

He averted his eyes then, and for a brief moment she thought she saw a flash of _something_ in them. If she didn’t know him any better, she could’ve sworn it was—guilt?

Something was wrong.

It took a few seconds for Goal to shake the shock and confusion, and to find her voice again. “What’s gotten into you?”

No reply.

“You were trying to mess around in your own head. Your consciousness got split.”

Rufus muttered something inaudible. He still wouldn’t look at her. In fact, it seemed as though he wanted to look at anything _but_ her. Goal crossed her arms and forced aside the rising feelings of concern. It wasn’t unlike Rufus to be difficult, after all, even though she thought she’d dealt with the worst of it already. The situation probably just put him in a bad mood.

“Don’t tell me you’re going to act like a child too… I’m just trying to help.”

“Shut up.”

“…excuse me?”

He stood up, causing the chair to scrape loudly against the floor as he pushed it back. His eyes were on her now, narrowed, hostile, and suddenly she wished they weren’t. He bared his teeth like an animal. “Shut up! Stop acting like you care.”

“Like I—” Goal could feel herself getting angry, but more than that she was alarmed. Something was most definitely wrong—but the possibility of altered or even corrupted data was one she didn’t even want to consider. “Rufus, are you implying I don’t care?”

Rufus’ only reply was a stiff shrug, and again he looked away. His eyes caught on the other two cartridges laid out on the table surface. He stared at them, so tense that Goal could see his shoulders shake if she looked closely enough.

“Hey, I’m talking to you,” she tried again. Just a hint of desperation seeped into her voice. “Rufus… Just tell me what’s wrong, please. This isn’t like you.”

He scoffed. “You don’t know what I’m like.”

A cartridge mix-up, maybe?

But he didn’t correct her on the name.

“Rufus?”

“You don’t know me at all.”

“Then wh—”

“It’s better that way.”

Before she had a chance to respond, Rufus had swiped both cartridges off the table in one swift motion, handling those precious things with an anxiety-inducing carelessness that made Goal feel nauseous. He pushed past her. She tried to reach for him, but her fingers merely brushed against his arm before he violently yanked it away and kept hurrying for the door.

“Rufus, wait—”

She took off after him. He ran. Outside. Ignoring the concerned looks from a few neighbours, she chased him down the habitat ring. She was faster than him, only needed a few more seconds to catch up, but as he went right for the nearest elevator, they turned out to be seconds she didn’t have.

“Come back—”

She didn’t make it in time. The door shut right in front of her, and Rufus was on the other side, gone.


End file.
